UBS says US tariff uncertainty to affect ad campaign schedules

UBS Securities says advertising campaigns are being paused or delayed, but not yet canceled, as U.S. trade policy uncertainty is making it difficult for marketers to set business plans

In Q1, ad budget growth started to deteriorate in February

Advertisers are increasingly reallocating budgets to performance-driven campaigns from brand awareness - brokerage

There is migration of budgets out of smaller platforms into larger; Meta META.O and Alphabet's GOOGL.O Google are well-positioned to benefit from this shift

But UBS reduces GOOGL's 2025 and 2026 revenue forecast by 1% and 2%, respectively, and GAAP EPS by 6% and 11%

Brokerage says, "search is likely to be the last place to lose digital budgets due to its proximity to consumers in a buying mindset"

UBS reduces META's 2025 and 2026 revenue forecast by 2% and 4%, respectively, and GAAP EPS by 8% and 10%

GOOGL up 2.6% at $156.85; META down 0.8% at $541.74; Pinterest PINS.N down 0.5% at $26.08, Snap SNAP.N up 1.5% at $7.95